Identify standards you want to target (State, National, Technology, 21st Century Skills)
From those standards, you create learning objectives and identify the important concepts from which you will build your Curriculum-Framing Questions.
Draft an assessment timeline and creat an assessment that will help you gauge student needs by assessing student prior knowledge at the beginning of the unit.
Addressing Standards
In Project-Based Learning, students show they have mastered standards through their products or performances.
They may make some choices in content, process, or products they produce, but they do not determine what they learn.
Instead of recalling facts, they apply new knowledge to demonstrate that they understand material.
Students delve deeply into content and apply their learning to real-world experiences.
Teachers organize instruction around questions that connect student interests to curriculum standards.
The first step in project design is to identify the standards you want your students to meet by the end of the unit.
From those standards, you derive learning objectives and meaningful questions.
NOTE: You can work with one or more teachers to develop your unit Portfolio.
Individual or Group Activity (depending upon whether or not you are working collaboratively to develop the Unit Portfolio.
Identifying Your Standards
Review the Standards and Objectives Rubric in the CD/Assessment folder. This rubric is also available in the Appendix on page A.08.
Download and save the standards document appropriate for your unit. Save the document in the unit_plan folder in the Portfolio folder.
Copy and paste any of the potential standard for your unit into the Unit Plan.
Creating Learning Objectives
Identifying what you want students to learn is the first, and most important, step in the unit design process.
From the standards you selected, create an inital set of learning objectives for your unit.
Objectives should describe what you want your students to learn.
Outline what you want your students to understand or demonstrate
Emphasize learning concepts using 21st century skills and higher-order thinking
Be assessed throughout the unit.
Objectives should not focus on activities, tasks, or technology skills.
Look at the table at the top of p. 2.03.
Steps to follow to create learning objectives for your Unit Plan.
Review your standards and consider what you want your students to be able to know, do, or understand.
Review the list of 21st century skills located in the CD/Thinking Skills folder.
Read the descriptions and select one to three skills that are the most relevant for your unit. Incorporate the selected skills into the objective you write for your Unit Plan.
Refer to the Standards and Objectives Rubric n the CD/Assessment folder as you develop your objectives to ensure they meet the expectations. The rubric is also found in the Appendix on page A.08.
Type your initial set of objectives into your Unit Plan.
After typing your draft objectives into your Unit Plan, highlight your objectives for higher-order thinking skill words using Revised Bloom's Taxonomy and 21st Century Skills availablein the CD/Thinking folder.
Revise your objectives to ensure they include higher-order thinking and 21st century skills.
Developing Curriculum-Framing Questions to Engage Students
Curriculum-Framing Questions connect learning in and across different disciplines by addressing topics that are interesting and important to students.
CFQs are critical for keeping projects focused on important learning. They encourage students to use higher order thinking skills, help students fully understand essential concepts, and provide a structure for organizing factual information.
CFQs consist of Essential, Unit, and Content Questions.
Small Group Brainstorming Activity: Complete your assigned rows with one person recording the brainstormed questions on the spreadsheet. Hint: To space between entrees in a single cell, press Alt and Enter to space down.
Draft Your Curriculum-Framing Questions
Creating CFQs is challenging and often requires many revisions.
You can either start with the Essential Question, and then work on the Unit and Content Questions or do the reverse.
Additional resources to help you write your CFQs may be found on CD/CFQs folder.
Review your standards and objectives then create your first draft of your CFQs.
Using the Curriculum-Framing Questions section of the Unit Plan Checklist, review the draft of your questions.
Note: The Unit Plan Checklist is located in the CD/Assessment folder and helps you monitor your progress as you work on your Unit Plan.
Revise your questions, if necessary.
Save the Unit Plan Checklist in the unit_plan folder of your Portfolio folder for future use.
Sharing your CFQs
In your group, share your first draft of your Curriculum-Framing Questions.
Use the rubric on p. 2.06 or in the CD/Assessment folder to provide feedback.
Take notes on the ideas provided by your colleagues.
Revise your questions based on your feedback.
Considering Multiple Methods of Assessment
You are now going to review different methods of assessment and think about how you will incorporate these methods into your unit.
You will draft an assessment timeline to show how you will use assessment throughout your unit.
ReadAssessment for Project-Based Learning located in the CD/Assessment folder which provides an overview for using student-centered assessments in the classroom. Think about how you might incorporate any of the ideas into your own unit. Optional: Take notes and save them in the course_resources folder of your unit_plan folder.
Look at the table at the bottom of p. 2.10. You need to understand and consider ways to include in your unit the two types of assessment and the five purposes.
Read about detailed assessment stategies for each of the 5 purposes.
Group Discussion: In your groups, address each of the questions on pp. 2.11-2.12 as they relate to your individual unit plans. Record helpful suggestions and ideas from your colleagues.
Drafting an Assessment Timeline
Assessment plan ensures that a project stays focused on learning goals
Should be developed before determining project activities and tasks
Assessment plan outines methods and instruments that define clear expectations and standards for quality in products and performances
Defines project monitoring checkpoints and strategies to both inform the teacher and keep the students on track
Plan should involve students in setting goals, reviewing and managing their learning progress during the project, and self-reflecting after the project.
The Assessment Plan section of the Unit Plan consists of an assessment sumary and an assessment timeline.
Look at the AssessmentTimeline sample at the bottomof p. 2.13.
Create a draft of your Assessment Timeline in your Unit Plan. Be sure to include assesment strategies for all 5 purposes.
Create an assessment for gauging student needs. This assessment should help you assess students' prior knowledge, interests, areas of weakness, or misconceptions about the content in your unit.
Explore some of the sample assessments to gauge student needs by looking at the resources in CD/Assessment folder.
Optional Resouces are listed on pp. 2.15-2.16.
In small groups, discuss each of the questions listed in #1 on page 2.17. Discuss how you might use some of the methods listed in #2 on p. 2.17 to collect information about student needs and prior knowledge/understanding.
Optional: Use the table on p. 2.18 to plan.
Create your assessment following the guidelines in Step 3 on p. 2.19.
Save your assessment in the Assessment folder in your Porfolio folder.
Review your assessment following #4-6, pp. 2.19-2.20 and revise your assessment as needed.
Create a Presentation about Your Unit
Components of your presentation:
Unit Summary
Targeted Standards and Objectives
Curriculum-Framing Questions
Assessment Timeline
This presentation may serve as the beginning for your Portfolio Showcase in module 8.
Browse some presentations in the CD/Unit Portfolios, Unit Portfolio Presentations
Write a draft of your Unit Summary
3-5 sentences
Briefly describe the topics, key activities, student products, and possible roles students assume in the project scenario.
Create an Outline for the Unit Presentation
Use the Outline Pane in PowerPoint to help oganize your thoughts and focus on the presentation content.
Create slides to guide your presentation about initial ideas for your Unit Plan
Unit summary
What you hope to accomplish in the unit, both for yourself and for your students
Targeted Standards and Objective
CFQs
Assessment Timeline
How the gauging student needs assessment will help you and your students plan for upcoming activities in the unit
What feedback or additional ideas would you like?
Refer to Step 3 on p. 2.23 and Step 4 on p. 2.24 to add the basics and refine your slides.
Upload your presentation as a document in the Group Engage Group.
Reflection for Module 2
Respond to the prompt in the Group blog, labeled Module 2 Reflection. Remember to click on "comment" to enter your reflection.
Module 2: Planning My Unit
What we will do:
Addressing Standards
NOTE: You can work with one or more teachers to develop your unit Portfolio.
Individual or Group Activity (depending upon whether or not you are working collaboratively to develop the Unit Portfolio.
Identifying Your Standards
Creating Learning Objectives
Identifying what you want students to learn is the first, and most important, step in the unit design process.
From the standards you selected, create an inital set of learning objectives for your unit.
Objectives should describe what you want your students to learn.
- Outline what you want your students to understand or demonstrate
- Emphasize learning concepts using 21st century skills and higher-order thinking
- Be assessed throughout the unit.
Objectives should not focus on activities, tasks, or technology skills.Steps to follow to create learning objectives for your Unit Plan.
Developing Curriculum-Framing Questions to Engage Students
Curriculum-Framing Questions connect learning in and across different disciplines by addressing topics that are interesting and important to students.
CFQs are critical for keeping projects focused on important learning. They encourage students to use higher order thinking skills, help students fully understand essential concepts, and provide a structure for organizing factual information.
CFQs consist of Essential, Unit, and Content Questions.
Essential Questions
What is a big idea? (http://www.authenticeducation.org/bigideas/nj_videos/bigideas.html)
What is an Essential Question?
http://www.authenticeducation.org/bigideas/nj_videos/eq.html
Unit Questions
Content Questions
Presentation on Essential, Unit, and Content Questions (CD/CFQ folder)
Review the Curriculm-Framing Questions Rubric on p. 2.06
(The rubric is also available on the CD/Assessment folder and in the Appendix o p. A.02.
Using an Online Collaborative Web Site to Practice CFQ's
Draft Your Curriculum-Framing Questions
Sharing your CFQs
Considering Multiple Methods of Assessment
- You are now going to review different methods of assessment and think about how you will incorporate these methods into your unit.
- You will draft an assessment timeline to show how you will use assessment throughout your unit.
Read Assessment for Project-Based Learning located in the CD/Assessment folder which provides an overview for using student-centered assessments in the classroom. Think about how you might incorporate any of the ideas into your own unit. Optional: Take notes and save them in the course_resources folder of your unit_plan folder.Look at the table at the bottom of p. 2.10. You need to understand and consider ways to include in your unit the two types of assessment and the five purposes.
Group Discussion: In your groups, address each of the questions on pp. 2.11-2.12 as they relate to your individual unit plans. Record helpful suggestions and ideas from your colleagues.
The Assessment Plan section of the Unit Plan consists of an assessment sumary and an assessment timeline.
Look at the AssessmentTimeline sample at the bottomof p. 2.13.
Create a draft of your Assessment Timeline in your Unit Plan. Be sure to include assesment strategies for all 5 purposes.
Create an assessment for gauging student needs. This assessment should help you assess students' prior knowledge, interests, areas of weakness, or misconceptions about the content in your unit.
Create a Presentation about Your Unit
Reflection for Module 2